By MARIO AGUIRRE

Amid flickering camera lights, Sandra Roa gently blew out a candle at her first birthday party. Through those photographs she fondly remembers the experience, which she likens to a symbolic “calling” that later intrigued her to pursue journalism.

“From that point on, I would always stare at pictures from family albums, looking at clothes, the interactions between people,” said Roa, a student at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. “I was really obsessed with looking at these pictures.”

She proclaims herself an “odd ball,” a title she wears proudly as the artist-type in her Colombian family. But even more unusual is her sparsely furnished New York City apartment, which she says contains only the bare essentials: books, photo equipment and clothes.

That seems fitting for a visual artist who is fixated on mastering the art of comprehensive storytelling. Along with photography, Roa enjoys chronicling the lifestyles of various Latino cultures through video footage and audio slide shows.

Roa refers to herself as a hustler for juggling several occupations — she refuses to call them “jobs” — at one time, including work in fashion design, graphic design and costume design. She also teaches a couple of hours each week at the International Center of Photography.

But through it all, she says, “photography has been constant in my life. That has always been a common denominator no matter what it is that I was doing before.”

Roa, 33, isn’t exactly sure what the future will hold, but she says she’ll “live out my whole life trying to complete my work.”